Dr. Alexandra Andhov is Associate Professor of Corporate Law and Law and Technology at the University of Copenhagen, Faculty of Law and Founder & Director of Copenhagen Legal Tech Lab
Over the past years, a lot has been written and said about the future of lawyers and also about the future lawyers – their knowledge and skill set. Diverse tools are currently being developed with the speed of lightning. And even though the speed of development in itself is highly problematic, the purpose of this blog post is to provide you – law students and legal practitioners – with a brief overview of the seven essential skills and tools that you should acquire and continuously improve.
1️. Legal Research
No matter what you have been reading about GPT4/GPTx and its ability to pass bar admission tests, the art of law is not just about finding the law or about applying and interpreting it but also about finding new possibilities and distinct interpretations. This comes only if YOU – actually do the readings and build your own knowledge. Knowing what the law says is one thing, but the ability to combine it in practice with unforeseeable elements is another. Knowing what questions to ask and how to approach the research will never be superseded by any digital tool itself. You need to know what you are looking for. AI is so far good only in the research or combination of multiple queries, but you still need to learn how to use it, be creative and combine existing legal research tools with new methods.
Tools:
- For the US:
- Westlaw /Lexis Nexis /Bloomberg/FindLaw/Ravel Law (uses AI)
- For Europe:
- EULawLive/EU versions of Westlaw & Lexis Nexis – the US tools have been adjusted, but they do not truly solve the pain of proper EU-wide review and research – thus, hint-hin — there is a hole in the market!
- For Denmark:
- Retsinformation/KarnovOnline/Pandektes (still in Beta, but promising)
Once you know how to find the law and work with the law, you might need to improve your presentation skills and possibly forget the old, though reliable, tools like PowerPoint.
2️. Presentation Software
Lawyers should be almost as good as marketing people when using presentation software – persuade or perform. Lawyers must persuade when presenting their findings or strategy and perform before courts, clients and other lawyers. Thus, having access to the tools that can help you catch the attention of your audience will put you ahead.
Tools:
- Beautiful AI (AI-powered presentation software) – easy and aligned – no time spent on positioning the text;
- PREZI – helps you create a story and keeps the slides active;
- Canva – gives you so many options that you might even get lost in them;
What you learn when you prepare diverse presentations is that the visualisation matters – the way the text floats and is shown matters. Once you optimise your slides, you might consider working on the way your contracts look, how you design the privacy policy on a website or how you inform the renters about their rights.
Here, a great resource is Margaret Hagan’s Legal Design Toolbox – so don’t be shy to use it!
3. Collaborative Design Tools
Once you approach design as part of the way you create content, you might need to start working with collaborative design tools. However, not many lawyers themselves will use these tools every day. Though, if you work with any tech teams, it will be expected that you are familiar with these tools, and you can at least review the content and comment on the design of the web app and possibly improve some of it.
Tools:
- Mural – this helps you think visually about any project or case – you can even use it for your tort law exams to build a timeline and facts overview;
- Figma – many developers are using this when developing their products;
- Few legal tech companies have been working on specific collaborative tools designed for the work of lawyers, such as Juristic, Proceedy, Visiodocs;
At Copenhagen Legal/Tech Lab, we offer our KU students access to several legal tech tools – the sooner you familiarise yourself with them and start to use some or all of them, the better you will become at utilising them.
4. Project Management
This might come as a surprise, but lawyers are not very good at managing their tasks and obligations. We tend to keep our notebooks, stickies or calendars as low-key management tools. Already, at the University, one should keep track of deliverables and have a clear overview of the due dates, but also of the division of tasks within your teams if you are working on a collaborative project.
Tools:
- Trello – a great start for managing tasks, and time and keeping an overview of to-do lists;
- Asana – you can create layers and layers of distinction on the tasks, deliverables and responsibilities;
- Jira – more tuned for tech developers;
5. Basics of Coding
A basic understanding on what is computational logic might be incredibly beneficial – for all of us working with technology or working on new technology or technology-driven companies, even if it’s not a must. Understanding the syntax and semantics, and other building blocks help us understand even how ChatGPT works.
Tools:
- YouTube – it provides millions of hours of basic coding from C++ to Python or Java;
- Coursera/Udemy and alike offer online courses where anyone can sign up;
- Computational Law – analogue introduction into the basics combined with a digital adds-on through podcasts;
6. Understanding AI and prompting
If you wish to use AI tools efficiently, you also need to learn how to use them. As with everything, it is best to test and play with the tool, so you naturally acquire the skills. But possibly, it does not necessarily interest you, or you would like a bit of help. The AI tools do not work as the traditional Google search. Thus, you should learn a bit about prompting and how you can get the answers that you are looking for out of the AI tool.
Tools:
- ChatGPT – in its basic form, is free. The advanced solutions are subject to fees;
- Perplexity AI – this AI extension explains and helps you understand any website;
- Wiseone – you can use this tool to enhance your reading of an article
If you wish to learn more about how to work with Large Language Models (LLMs) – here is a good resource.
7. Active Listening
The above tools might be utterly useless if you do not adequately listen. Every law student and lawyer needs to work on their skill to listen and ask questions actively. Lawyers tend to “know it all” and often forget that the devil is in the detail, which is often hidden in something that a client or your colleague shared with you. My good colleague Léonard shared with me a good hack is to listen with the objective of being able to summarise back what the person just said, and if it is a crucial point and you want to make sure that you are on the right track – ask – Do I understand correctly that … ? This way, you will not only remember what the person said, but the person will actually leave this conversation with a feeling that you genuinely listened.
Tool:
- Your attention
So listen, summarise and ask questions.